


Do You Believe in Magic?

by calligraphypenn



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Angst, Fluff, M/M, Music, Post Karl/Anders, Potential Anders/Fenris, implied minor character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-20
Updated: 2016-05-20
Packaged: 2018-06-09 13:15:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6908680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calligraphypenn/pseuds/calligraphypenn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders runs a tiny run-down pharmacy in the bad part of town, and listens to a lot of music that is banned by the authorities. Fenris objects.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do You Believe in Magic?

“Do you believe in magic,” Anders sang, skidding across the floor in his thin-soled shoes. In one hand he was waving a feather duster, barely even trying to dust anymore as the music filled his tiny pharmacy.

 “I’ll tell you about magic and it’ll free your soul, but it’s like trying to tell a stranger about rock and roll!” he crooned, flipping the “Open” sign to “Closed”. Then he skidded over to the counter, and grabbed a dust cloth, swiping it across the glass top in wide stokes.

 His clinic was filled with golden dust motes, and the long glass windows of the old ancient store were filled with plants and peeling, sun-painted posters. Anders danced over to the hand-bobbing lucky cat on the back counter ledge and gave its white head a brief wipe.

 “Magic! Do you believe in magic?” he shouted, snatching up the bottle of glass cleaner as a microphone.

 Then the music stopped abruptly and Anders spun around.

 Fenris stood there, his face his usual mixture of baffled irritation that it always had whenever he looked at Anders. In one tattooed hand, he held Anders’ battered iPhone, which was connected to the speakers.

 “There is a bell on the door,” Anders said indignantly, but more to himself. He hadn’t heard the elf come in at all. Fenris was an extremely argumentative (with him), extremely attractive elf (to everybody), who now stood in the early springtime heat wearing a plain white t-shirt and black pants that flared around his hips and clung to his ankles, down to black canvas Tims. Isabela had sworn that Fenris always wore Yeezy, with the twinkle in her eye that said she was joking, but Anders had still spent one perilous night trying to look down the back of Fenris’ shirt for a tag.

 “Are you insane?” Fenris asked. “I could hear this all the way from around the corner. This song is banned.”

 “I don’t give a good Maker’s damn,” Anders said. “You killjoy. Are you here for your prescription?”

 “I am,” Fenris said, still swiping through Anders’ phone.

 “Black Magic” by Little Mix started playing through the speakers, albeit at a much lower volume than before.

 “This song is about blood magic,” Fenris said accusingly.

 “No, it isn’t,” Anders said, weighing out Fenris’ order.

 Next up was “Magic” by Coldplay.

 ”Is every single song in this playlist about magic?” Fenris demanded.

 “Yup,” Anders said, almost laughing. “One hundred percent contraband.”

 “Only you could be this much of an idiot,” Fenris said. “You don’t have the song by that band—MAGIC with an exclamation point on the end? “Rude”?“

 “Ew, no, those guys really were blood mages,” Anders said.

 Then the speakers played  “Magic“ by Bruce Springsteen.

 “Hmm,” Fenris said.

  _Can’t say anything bad about that one, can you,_ Anders thought. Fenris was quiet as the words filled every cranny of the small shop. Anders put Fenris’ pain pills in a plastic bag and stapled it closed, his hands working automatically.

  _I got shackles on my wrists_  
Soon I’ll slip and I’ll be gone  
Chain me in a box in the river  
And rising in the sun.

 The song faded out, and Anders slid the package down the counter to Fenris, who stopped it with one hand.

 ”Are all of your playlists like this?” Fenris said.

 “There aren’t that many songs about magic, you know,” Anders said drily.  

 Maybe music was something he and Fenris could talk about. That might be refreshing—he didn’t even know what kind of music Fenris liked–

 “What’s this playlist? _A loves K, F the C?”_

 Anders froze, the rag he had picked up falling from his fingers. His heart seemed to beat slower, as the chiming sounds of the first song on that playlist began to play.

  _Wouldn’t it be nice if we were older_  
Then we wouldn’t have to wait so long  
And wouldn’t it be nice to live together  
In the kind of world where we belong–

 He crossed the store in two steps, almost not feeling his face for how numb it had gotten.

 “You should go now, we’re closed,” he bit out, and snatched the iPod from Fenris’ hand, not seeing how Fenris stiffened at his closeness. With nerveless fingers, Anders hit the pause button.

 He clapped his iPod facedown on the counter, and stood with his back to Fenris, trying to master his expression before the elf could see–

 Instead, he heard the crinkle of plastic and the tinkling of the bell.

 He turned. Fenris had left, and his silhouette shadowed the plants on Anders’ window display for a moment, and was gone.

 Anders turned the iPod back up on the counter, and after a moment’s hesitation, he hit play.

  _You know it seems the more we talk about it  
It only makes it worse to live without it…_

_Wouldn’t it be nice?_


End file.
